Wittgenstein, Metaphors, and Mental Concepts

Abstract

Wittgenstein wrote the following, rather unsettling, remark towards the end of his
life: "The "inner" is a delusion. That is: the whole complex of ideas alluded to by
this word is like a painted curtain drawn in front of the scene of the actual word
use" (LW2 p.84). My aim in this short paper is to place this passage in the correct
context of Wittgenstein's later philosophy, and to suggest a fruitful direction in
which a Wittgensteinian investigation of mental concepts may develop.